Toxic hydrogen sulphide is a silent killer that often goes unidentified as the real cause of fatalities or sick pond fish. Never disturb a biological filter bed without rinsing and flushing the chamber. Beware of walking on an in-pond gravel filter bed!

Moving bed filters offer various solutions for the problem of retaining the moving media in a place without restricting the flow and preventing loss of media. At a high flow rate, a simple grid at the exit point is often not good enough to avoid this from happening. A retaining grid that meets the requirement of a specific media is need. We approach the problem in a slightly different way.

Jumping fish and swimming speed

Many koi owners have experienced a fish flapping on the lawn because it jumped out of the water. Many have spent fruitless hours trying to revive these suffering fish in the hope of a miracle happening. We want to blame someone for this mishap and are quick to find the culprit, usually a protection net that was carelessly closed over the tank, or worse, failure to use the net at all. They call that negligence.

While the morphological variation was important in the creation of koi as they are today, the expression of color is certainly central to defining koi as ornamental. It is true to say that without colour koi would never have developed. Skin pigment cells produce the various colors. Erythrophores and xanthophores contain carotenoid pigments and produce various shades of red or yellow. Melanophores are black and contain melanin.

In a recent study, Bassin et. al. (2016) assessed the activity of the suspended and attached biomass on two types of moving-bed biofilm carriers under identical conditions. The moving-bed biofilm reactors were loaded with K1 (MBBR1) and white Mutag BioChip™ (MBBR2) and evaluated at different pollutant loads.

In our hobby the body shape of a fish tells us much. The concerned hobbyists try to gauge the sex, the age, future potential and quality from what they see. When looking at photos however, it is easy to form the wrong impression. Be careful to judge too quickly.

When viewing photos of fish, one must be aware how serious the angle of view can effect the photo.

Aquaculture professionals, breeders and koi communities use Mutag BioChip™ as biofilter media for best water quality and large savings on OPEX

The Mutag BioChip™ speeds up pond filters with 3,000 m² of active surface area per m³ of filter media for the steadily growing nitrifying microorganisms for reducing the ammonia which is produced by the fish.

Ever since I got involved with koi shows the seeming endless chore of water changes was a concern of mine. Not only was it a labour intensive task requiring constant attention and management; it also was a very wasteful act. On more than one occasion we

Growth dispersion

This article is for carp and koi breeders of all persuasions and skills. The experienced farmer who wants to improve his breeding returns and the first-time novice breeder who do not know how to react to this observation. We revisit ‘ancient knowledge’ to explain common observations of fry when indulging in breeding, whether professionally of for pleasure.

We are all like that. We want the best that our money can buy. Sometimes we simply want the best car to drive out from behind our walled properties into the street. But when we sit back and consider the options, our senses override our pride. The money in our pockets speaks.